Mental passivity is evil - here-and-now, although probably not at all times and places in history.
Why? - Because when the environment is evil, we our-selves must be active in order to avoid becoming evil ourselves.
A passive person is (here, now) an evil person: he or she is a person who is actually living in service of evil, on the side of evil, promoting the agenda of evil.
Active in what way? Well, it must be an activity in what stands-apart-from - autonomous of - that which is evil; and which is itself good.
In a world where all large institutions are clearly (overall, sometimes very completely) corrupted into service of that which is evil. So we cannot look to external institutions to save us.
Furthermore, we cannot look to individuals either! The past weeks have shown what a high proportion of the population are passive with respect to institutions when it comes to their beliefs. So probably we cannot even find many individuals to guide us; because so many (nearly all) individuals are agents of evil in their own right.
Maybe we are in a situation where know no single person (in real life) we could confidently regard as being on-the-side-of-good, and towards whom it would be good to be passive. That must be the case for many, many people.
If we want to join the side of good; then we are on our own; and also we must look outside of human society for guidance.
We must expect to discover for ourselves what is good; and in pursuit of what is good we must be active agents; we must live actively from that source of good.
From there, it is over to you - because you need to decide (for your-self) what is the source of uncontaminated good in the world? And how you could get access to - and live-from - that source?
Nobody can tell you this (because nobody can be trusted, except for those you already trust to be on the side of good).
You must work it out for yourself - or rather, you must recognise and decide where you absolutely belief goodness to derive-from.
(Myself, I believe there is a source of goodness external to my in God the creator and Jesus Christ the saviour - and that the discernment and wisdom of Jesus is avaiable to me from the universal spiritual presence of the Holy Ghost: This is revelation. I also believe that there is an internal, innate, uncontaminated source of divine goodness in myself - God-within: what may be termed my real self: This is intuition, or direct-knowing. But - so far as you are concerned, me saying this is just someone you don't know spouting stuff of unknown validity. Me saying-it has no value as such. You need to know that there exists an accessible source of goodness; you need to know what it is and how to discover it. And then do it from your own inner resources: actively.)
8 comments:
This is a keen observation. I think it ties in well with the crucial difference between religious passivity and religious activity. Up until now, it was sufficient for people to simply and passively go through the motions of religion via obedience (attend church, receive sacraments, etc.).
As the church closures around the world seem to indicate, that time is now behind us. In fact, the internet masses, lack of sacraments, etc., only seem to exacerbate religious passivity;is that is, it is inferior to the former passivity. The only way forward is to become religiously active via creativity. A whole new approach and manner of being (and a great deal of courage).
Of course, I don't mean to suggest that religious passivity is explicitly evil, but that it might no longer be adequate.
@Francis - ABsolutely - That is indeed the clearest difference. It has been approaching for a while, but in the past weeks has become acute.
Christians have a choice of subordination to a bankrupt institution operating in service to evil; or going it alone. New converts will need to plough their own furrow from the get-go.
We are seeing a repetition of what happened in the mid 20th century when an obedient and conscientious, well-behaved - i.e. spiritually passive - people (such as the Germans and Japanese), are taken over by (what became, incrementally) evil totalitarian authorities.
@Frank "I don't mean to suggest that religious passivity is explicitly evil,"
I *do* mean to suggest that; insofar as religious passivility has become a collaborator (or active servant) with the System led by genuine evil... (i.e. the side of evil in teh spiritual war) although 'explicit' may be a red herring, in that no effective evil decalres itself; and always works by including a mixture of good at any given time.
This position is extremely difficult for many devout Christians to acknowledge, but insofar as they are failing to be honest, this will surely come back to bite them by their being led astray into supporting Antichrist figures and movements.
Yes, that's a valid point. Honesty is crucial. Dishonesty is becoming impossible to defend.
I believe you are describing the ethical individual of final participation.
@Francis - Terry Boardman says the same in the essay I posted yesterday.
@B-O - Indeed I am.
@ Bruce - Thanks. Very interesting. Unfortunately, I haven't found the time to give Boardman's essay the thorough read it deserves. I will do so this evening.
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